For South Korean male participants, winning a gold medal in the Asian Games or Olympic Games not only brings honor but also grants them a military exemption.
Military service is compulsory for men in South Korea, with almost all able-bodied persons required to serve in the army for 18 months by the age of 28.
Son Heung-min, captain of Premier League soccer team Tottenham Hotspur, received an exemption from his mandatory military conscription in 2018 after winning gold at the Asian Games with South Korea. “Times have indeed changed. It seems right that esports should receive the same legal consideration for military service exemption,” Shin Min-gu, a Seoul resident in his 20s, told CNN Sport.
“I believe that everyone should fulfill their national defense duties. While I acknowledge that athletes winning gold medals at the Asian Games elevate our country’s status, I think their achievements should remain distinct from military service,” Lee Kyung-dae, a 35-year-old business owner in Seoul, told CNN.
South Korean Kim Gwan-woo won the Street Fighter V final on Thursday, earning the nation its historic first ever Asian Games gold medal in esports, but given that Kim is 44, he would have already completed his mandatory military service. Seventeen-year-old Park Ki-young, who was representing South Korea in FIFA 4, though was clear before his competition began: “I have a greater desire to win the prestigious gold medal than getting the military exemption, which is the biggest prize of participating in a big competition like the Asian Games.”
This transformation can be attributed to various factors, including the sensational popularity of Blizzard’s StarCraft, a real-time strategy game released in 1999 which was known for its incredible player-versus-player gameplay. The pinnacle of competitive League is the “League of Legends World Championship,” which began with eight teams over three days in 2011 and has since expanded to a 22-team competition spanning over a month of games for the 2023 edition.
“He was one of the first players to treat the game with a level of seriousness that a lot of other athletes now have in this sport. The talent multiplied by hard work is very akin to Michael Jordan,” Chow said. The games that will feature as official medal titles include EA Sports FC Online , PUBG Mobile , Arena of Valor , League of Legends, DOTA 2, Dream Three Kingdoms 2 and Street Fighter 5.The gaming events will be hosted in an expansive 82,000-square-meter stadium equipped with 4,500 seats and four large screens.
While this marked a significant breakthrough for the industry, the series featured virtual sports, dance, archery and other more obscure games that left existing fans with emotions ranging from indifference to outright anger. Esports analyst Jess Bolden took it one step further, saying on X that the IOC “should be ashamed” and that “none of the featured games are actual esports.”
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